Posted on 01/24/2006 7:15:12 AM PST by Utah Binger
LOS ANGELES - As 2006 dawned, Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven - about a ''divinely ordered'' double murder in 1984 by two members of a breakaway Mormon sect - was fresh off the best-seller list. Warren Jeffs, the polygamist prophet of this splinter group, the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was on FBI wanted lists. And the world's first-ever ''Mormon- sploitation Retrospective'' of vintage fear-mongering anti-Mormon movies had just finished at the fringy Pioneer Theater in New York's East Village.
In public relations terms, this is not the easiest time to have the words ''Latter,'' ''Day'' and ''Saints'' anywhere close together in your name. And the going may get rougher after the filmmaker Christopher Cain finishes his new movie about one of the darkest moments in Mormon history, the Mountain Meadows massacre of 1857, in which 137 pioneers from Arkansas were killed in Utah by a raiding party whose ties to the LDS Church are still in dispute.
An early look at parts of "September Dawn" - viewed in a West Los Angeles editing room with Cain and his longtime editor, Jack Hofstra - suggests that there will be fresh debate when it finally reaches the public.
(Excerpt) Read more at sltrib.com ...
Well if you read the thread there are some interesting posts regarding some of the known facts. There are plenty of good books out there that summarize the event.
It is the unknown facts that are in dispute and that have caused so much pain for the families of the victims of the massacre. They have never received a decent burial. Until recently there was no marker of the event. This was the single worst act of murder in America's history, until the time of the Oklahoma City bombings!
My family member, along with other members of the Church killed these poor innocent people. We owe them the truth. The Church owes them respect and full disclosure if nothing else.
That is the problem Moose, the tale has never been told.
The murderers and the Church kept it secret and hidden for as long as possible, they were silent for three years. When the story came out, the Church blamed one man. Twenty years later, he alone took the blame. He was a scapegoat - number 4 in command. That means he received orders from one or more of his superiors.
Do you honestly think one lone man ran around and shot over 120 people point blank in the head?
Please note the "picture's real power will most likely come not from history"
In fact there may not be any historical facts. Sadly some people will see this work of fiction as being true and add it to their Mormon bashing.
"Just a big FYI"
I'm a Southern Baptist boy, but I used to
date a Mormon girl in high school. Got
interested in LDS history and theology.
She was originally from a town close to the
Mountain Meadow.
When I was in college, because I'm American
Indian (not Native American, thank you),
I thought about going up there one summer
to look into exactly how big a role the Shivwits
Paiutes actually played in the matter.
Wrote to a Southern Baptist pastor in the area
and told him of my plan.
He wrote write back and said in so many words,
"I don't want to say you'd be in any physical
danger, but some of the children of the perpetrators
are still alive. Might give it additional thought."
I took the letter to the mother of the girl I used
to date. She read it. "It's good advice," she
said. I decided I was a writer, not a crusader.
By that time in my life, I was married and had
children. Decided I didn't need to know all
that much about the matter.
How true. Will the truth ever be told ? I don't think so. The story will will add more fictions every time it's told and many will say this fiction is true. Very sad.
Yes that is sad. Once Hollyweird get ahold of it, well you never know.
Too bad the story was hidden to begin with.
Good grief. What about the extermination order issued by the Gov of Missouri - to kill Mormons, even their kids.
In all fairness, everyone should look at this web site about the Haun's Mill Massacre.
http://www.jwha.info/mmff/mlet1098.htm
Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. I'm a Mormon.
Is that you Ricky?
Really, we need to stop blaming the victims here. They were peaceful immigrants trying to start a new life in California...only to lose theirs at Mountain Meadows.
Mormons too, were victims of horrible violence. They lost many loved ones not only to murder, but to the elements of nature as they were driven from their homes.
It in NO WAY excuses what they did. They committed an atrocious act and hid behind one man.
They were peaceful immigrants trying to start a new life in California...
Have you read MASSACRES OF THE MOUNTAINS by J.P. Dunn Jr.(1888)
It has a write up on the MMM that will make your blood boil. Definitly not LDS frendly. He also finds Mormons involved in instigating several Indian wars against the U.S.
Chuck Norris could do it.
I won't dispute that, as it is obvious. The problem is, what *is* the truth? From my own limited knowledge of the event, and from what I've gleaned on this thread, I find it hard to understand exactly *what* happened.
It is entirely possible that when your family member went to these people, along with whoever accompanied him, that wholesale slaughter was not the agenda, so much as "encouraging" these people to settle elsewhere, particularly if the postulation of prior "bad blood" has some basis in fact. It is easy to visualize such a "showdown" as suddenly getting totally out of the control of anyone involved.
So, the unknown facts are as follows. First: did Bishop Lee act under orders from higher up within the Church heirarchy? Secondly: if so, exactly *what* were those orders? If Brigham Young, or anyone directly between him and your relative, ordered him to encourage the Arkansans to move on, by a show of force, but did *not* order wholesale slaughter, then it's one thing. If Young, or his deputies ordered their elimination, then it's another. Neither is provable to date, at least with such information on the matter as the church has divulged. The Church's *official* position is that he acted on his own, but that rings a bit hollow, in that he did *not* go to the Arkansans alone, but in the company of others, numerous others.
Will the truth ever be known? Unlikely, at best, as the Church just wishes the whole issue would disappear with the passage of time, and refuses to face the issue of what happened on that day in 1857, and why it happened...
the infowarrior
Ha!
He should star in the movie!
Praise God! I look forward to seeing you in heaven.
I'm a Mormon
How can you claim Christ as Lord and believe all that the Mormon prophets have said?
If you don't believe the mormon prophets why are you still a Mormon.
At least him and Rambo together . . . with a knife each.
They encouraged them to press onward by dropping their bodies on the soil there?
Ridiculous!
They did not have, and were denied comforts, ie food, water and rest as they passed through much of Utah. At MM, they decide to rest despite the patent hostility towards them. They rested and watered/grazed their animals. They had no intentions of staying in Utah, they were pressing onward.
They're not Mormon.
SOME Mormons slaughtered innocents. Were they rogue, or were they ordered to do so by Brigham Young?
The GENERAL pattern of LDS behavior toward non-LDS moving through Utah and settling in Utah suggests it was a rogue group of Mormons.
But, then, that doesn't feed the conspiracy theories of people like Richard Abanes, who is convinced the Mormon church is a secret society determined to overthrow the United States government.
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